The Nation - News from Sept. 10, 1987

A drug given to liver transplant patients to prevent rejection of the new organ has been linked to coma, paralysis and other side effects, and extremely low cholesterol levels may be to blame, a researcher said. Dr. Piet de Groen of the Mayo Clinic at Rochester, Minn., speaking at an international organ transplant conference in Pittsburgh, Pa., said the side effects of cyclosporine appeared in patients who had extremely low cholesterol levels in the week after transplant and who began receiving two or three days after surgery.